Meryl Streep's THE TESTAMENT OF MARY Audio Book Out 9/10

Iconic stage and screen performer Meryl Streep lends her recognizable voice to a new audio book adaptation of Colm Toibin's THE TESTAMENT OF MARY, recently seen on Broadway in a stage adaptation by the original author starring acclaimed actress Fiona Shaw.

Streep reads the unabridged edition of the controversial novel originally published by Scribner in 2012, out next month on CD and digital download.

The official description of THE TESTAMENT OF MARY is as follows: "PROVOCATIVE, HAUNTING AND INDELIBLE, Colm Tóibín's portrait of Mary presents her as a solitary older woman still seeking to understand the events that become the narrative of the New Testament and the foundation of Christianity. In the ancient town of Ephesus, Mary lives alone, years after her son's crucifixion. She has no interest in collaborating with the authors of the Gospel. They are her keepers, providing her with food and shelter and visiting her regularly. She does not agree that her son is the Son of God; nor that his death was "worth it"; nor that the "group of misfits he gathered around him, men who could not look a woman in the eye," were holy disciples. Mary judges herself ruthlessly (she did not stay at the foot of the Cross until her son died-she fled, to save herself), and her judgment of others is equally harsh. This woman whom we know from centuries of paintings and scripture as the docile, loving, silent, long-suffering, obedient, worshipful mother of Christ becomes a tragic heroine with the relentless eloquence of Electra or Medea or Antigone. Tóibín's tour de force of imagination and language is a portrait so vivid and convincing that our image of Mary will be forever transformed."

THE TESTAMENT OF MARY by Colm Toibin as read by Meryl Streep will be released on September 10.

The Broadway production of THE TESTAMENT OF MARY starring Fiona Shaw ran at the Walter Kerr Theatre in a production directed by Deborah Warner for a limited run this Spring and received three Tony Award nominations including Best Play for Colm Toibin, who penned the stage adaptation of his novel.